Objective: to identify characteristics of women who have suffered severe lactational mastitis.
Method: a descriptive, retrospective, documentary, quantitative study was performed. Data were collected from patient records of 114 hospitalized women from January of 2009 to December of 2013. Data were analyzed by using descriptive statistics.
Results: a higher percentage of severe lactational mastitis was found in young, primiparous women who had completed high school, who had no partner, and did not have a job; 96.5% of women had breast complications before admission and remained hospitalized an average of 4.4 days; at discharge, 23.7% of women had weaned their infants.
Conclusion: this study showed that severe lactational mastitis can cause great harm to the woman and the baby.